Heh, so my sister says, "Bring some crabs for dinner to Casper (WY) with you (from Bay Area)." So I dutifully pick up some fresh crabs from the wharf, pack them in dry ice, put the whole lot in a cardboard box and head for the airport.

Imperious manager type: "Just how much dry ice is in the container, sir?"
ST: "Well, it was 10 lbs a few hours ago, probably 8 by now."
IM: "How much crab?"
ST: "Six pounds."
IM: "This box weighs 15 pounds now, sir, so that's about right, given the weight of the box. We're going to let this through."
ST: "Gee, I guess I should have said books rather than crabs, eh?"
IM: "This is nothing to joke about, sir. I have security right over there. Dry ice is considered an explosive in the luggage compartment in quantities in excess of 8 pounds."
ST: "Sorry."
IM: "Here's your tag. NEXT!"

So, yes, enclosed containers and all that. The crab was delicious, BTW. <g>

[quote]You can make a cool layer of fog in your dome or tent, and it'll fog more if kept in warm water. Put a colored light down by the floor and watch the effect. A laser pointer and some little mirrors or mirror balls will do wonders in fog!
[/quote]

killer idea.

in our cooler dry ice always has an odd effect on our fruit: makes them taste carobonated. it's bitchin. even the defrosted ones taste all weird like that.

For my dry ice cooler I kept it up off the ground, duct taped the opening, covered it with a mylar 'space' blanket and kept it in as much shade as possible. Between the two coolers I ran I never bought ice and I had enough ice on the last day for drinks.

Location of the ice in the cooler makes a slight difference. I had a mondo 104 qt cooler last year with two 25lb blocks of ice on the bottom, one on each end. Ice cream at the bottom between the blocks was rock hard, impossible to scoop. Ice cream at the top of the cooler got pretty runny. The cooler was a cheap one and not taped shut so that probably influenced things a bit. 50lb lasted 6 days in this condition.

Most foods didn't seem to care where they were in the cooler. They were happy to stay frozen as long as there was dry ice left. Ice cream is more temperature sensitive.

Buy it at an industrial gas supply house or equivalent rather than at grocery stores. I paid $11 per 25 pound block, while grocery stores seem to charge $1-3 per pound.

I got mine in Reno, go to the main page and enter 'dry ice' into the search box. I stay at the Sands (cheap on Sunday) and there is a bulk ice and dry ice place just a couple of blocks away. They are closed on Sunday but open early on Monday.

In the late 1980s, an acquaintance (sp?) of mine, who was a graduate student in the field of studying ice, was put in charge of disposing of a penguine which had been shot and killed in Antarctica in the late 1950s or early 1960s and had been put in storage at a local ice cream factory nearly that long. The ice cream factory had been using it in their warehouse to keep track of inventory, and a health inspector had finally noticed and told them "Get rid of that! Its unsanitary!" Anyway, having one of the few functional cars in our group, and no job to take up my time, I got drafted into helping him pick up the penguin, mailing material, dry ice, and transporting the whole mess to FedEx. Things went pretty much without a hitch, including the photographs of a bunch of us in various poses with said penguin. Eventually, with the help of the contents of a beanbag chair for insulation, the penguin was packed up and taken to FedEx, who immediatelly told the grad student that the box needed to be specially packed and labelled due to the dry ice. The FedEx office then closed for the day. The next day the penguin finally got sent to a musuem in the Twin Cities, where it was put into long term storage.

My other experience with dry ice was mostly as a witness. That is to say, I was working on one side of a shelving unit when my daydreaming was interrupted by an explosion. Since dust was falling from the ceiling, I at first thought that the explosion had come from above. It was shortly determined that it had, in fact, come from the opposite side of the shelving unit, where a co-worker was standing, rather dazed, in the midst of a cloud of white stuff, with the remains of a Mountain Dew bottle scattered, well, probably more than one or two hundred yards around him. It seems that, while making deliveries in the hospital, he had come across a chunk of dry ice and decided he wanted to keep it. The container he had available was an empty 20oz. Mountain Dew bottle, so he slipped the chunk of dry ice into the bottle, and screwed the lid down good and tight. He then left the bottle on a cart in Central Services while he went about his job.

Later, he saw that the bottle was swollen almost to a sphere... and, thinking to show if off to another of my co-workers, had picked it up. I don't recall whether or not he got the "Hey Erich! Look at this!" out of his mouth or not before it exploded in his had. He was lucky in that he got off with a few friction burns to his hand and a temporary ringing in his ears!

The moral of the story is, obviously, if you stick a chunk of dry ice in a pop bottle and screw down the lid, you must quickly hide it under the desk of someone you don't like...

"Nothing is withheld from us which we have conceived to do.Do things that have never been done."--Russell Kirsch

In the late 1980s, an acquaintance (sp?) of mine, who was a graduate student in the field of studying ice, was put in charge of disposing of a penguine which had been shot and killed in Antarctica in the late 1950s or early 1960s and had been put in storage at a local ice cream factory nearly that long. The ice cream factory had been using it in their warehouse to keep track of inventory, and a health inspector had finally noticed and told them "Get rid of that! Its unsanitary!" Anyway, having one of the few functional cars in our group, and no job to take up my time, I got drafted into helping him pick up the penguin, mailing material, dry ice, and transporting the whole mess to FedEx. Things went pretty much without a hitch, including the photographs of a bunch of us in various poses with said penguin. Eventually, with the help of the contents of a beanbag chair for insulation, the penguin was packed up and taken to FedEx, who immediatelly told the grad student that the box needed to be specially packed and labelled due to the dry ice. The FedEx office then closed for the day. The next day the penguin finally got sent to a musuem in the Twin Cities, where it was put into long term storage.

My other experience with dry ice was mostly as a witness. That is to say, I was working on one side of a shelving unit when my daydreaming was interrupted by an explosion. Since dust was falling from the ceiling, I at first thought that the explosion had come from above. It was shortly determined that it had, in fact, come from the opposite side of the shelving unit, where a co-worker was standing, rather dazed, in the midst of a cloud of white stuff, with the remains of a Mountain Dew bottle scattered, well, probably more than one or two hundred yards around him. It seems that, while making deliveries in the hospital, he had come across a chunk of dry ice and decided he wanted to keep it. The container he had available was an empty 20oz. Mountain Dew bottle, so he slipped the chunk of dry ice into the bottle, and screwed the lid down good and tight. He then left the bottle on a cart in Central Services while he went about his job.

Later, he saw that the bottle was swollen almost to a sphere... and, thinking to show if off to another of my co-workers, had picked it up. I don't recall whether or not he got the "Hey Erich! Look at this!" out of his mouth or not before it exploded in his had. He was lucky in that he got off with a few friction burns to his hand and a temporary ringing in his ears!

The moral of the story is, obviously, if you stick a chunk of dry ice in a pop bottle and screw down the lid, you must quickly hide it under the desk of someone you don't like...

"Nothing is withheld from us which we have conceived to do.Do things that have never been done."--Russell Kirsch

You can also get a nasty freezer burn! Back in my college days (it was LITERALLY days...) some friends and I headed down to Mardi Gras with The Smurf Baby, a blue oxygen tank that we got filled with nitrous oxide at the racing shop over in Ypsilanti. While serving my term as tankmaster, which of course included "testing" all of the balloons before handing them out, I got a little greedy and emptied one- When the ringing stopped and I came to, I discovered that my hand was frozen tight to the valve! I spent all of Mardi Gras catching beads lefthanded, with my North paw in gauze and blisters down the length of all of my fingers...

Easiest to find and use with (drive in/up service) is Crystal Ice and Oil.At 1345 W 4th street.Take Keystone south off I-80.Turn right at 4th.Not far then on right.Or 4th straight through town to the west.

Raley's on Peckham lane has it for cheaper than anywhere I've seen it here in town. Easiest way to get there is by the freeways.

Take I-80 to the 395 interchange, head south on 395 to the first "South Virginia St." exit. It will be the exit immediately after the "Moana Ln" exit. Turn right off the exit ramp, head north on Virginia st to Peckham ln. At Peckham and Virginia you'll see the Atlantis Casino. Turn left onto Peckham and then turn into the shopping center on your left. It's called "Reno Town Mall."

The Raley's is on the west side of the mall. You can't miss it. Dry ice is very cheap there. That's where my wife and I are getting ours.

We've always gotten ours at Scolari's on Pyramid Way. They're about a 1/2 mile from John Ascuaga's Nugget. There's also a strip mall with a Raley's, a gas station and I believe a Rite-Aid a little further up the road.

Pyramid Way is a "back way" up to the Playa. Just go that way and turn right at the south end of Pyramid Lake.

How cheap is "cheap" at these grocery stores, exactly? I've found it for $1-3 per pound. I think Scolari's was $2 a couple of years ago.

If you can, get it in 25 pound blocks from a dry ice supplier. I got a couple for $11 each at Airgas in San Bruno before my trip last year. I'm sure there is an equivalent place in Reno. Search the web or look up "dry ice" in the yellow pages.

Uhhh...Safeway? Nob Hill? Woodworm? The Halloween store downtown?
I was hoping for a good find on the price, but it's not happenin so far.
The only places I found are in Watsonville and that's a little out of the way for us busy bees.

"I believe in everything, nothing is sacred.
I believe in nothing, everything is sacred."

I would try the party store on Ocean in SC. I don't know what it's called. I thought it was Halloween HQ, but it's not in the yellow pgs, so...?
There are also numerous places to buy dry ice in Reno- those you can find using the search button on eplaya. Off the top of my head, there's Raley's and Scolero's.

At this point, I don't know who else to call. Looking for a better price that's more local. (70c/lb is bueno, but their hours won't work with our driving plans) Any suggestions? Hope this helps someone...